Tuesday, 29 May 2012

Finally the time has come for the Ta-Dah of my big blanket!!
Even though I finished her already 8 months ago, I never gave her a
proper TA-DAH moment, which I think my very first blanket deservers!
I saw I was coming near the big number so I carefully posted because I wanted it to be THE post of THE BIG BLANKET.

I'm teasing you with the close ups of some of my favourite squares....

Now first of all, the story of this blanket, that is also the story of why I learned to crochet...
Back in September 2010 my dear BF was so kind to bring me to a fair of girly crafts, stitching, knitting, crocheting and so on... after half an hour he was alredy bored to death!

Anyway, while we're there I saw some gorgeous patchwork blankets, so I told him I'd like to learn to sew properly to make one. But he said that he didn't like them at all, he liked the crocheted blankets that his mum and his aunt had made for him when he was a little guy. And in the end he said "Why don't you make a crochet blanket?"

So here I was, learning to crochet to make my dear boyfriend a brand new crocheted blanket.
I immediately decided for a granny square blanket because the patten was easy, it can be made a square at a time and then joining all at the end with the join as you go method wich I love and because I knew he would like the granny square pattern because it's the same of the other two blankets he has.

My inspiration was, as many other time has been, a creation of Lucy of Attic24, her own first blanket.

I started her in October 2010, making the very first squares, working on
them from time to time, making other things in the middle like the bag
or the decorations (of course other 2 great patterns of Lucy, you can see mine here).

Now that I see this picture I remember the lovely thing of blocking squares: it takes a lot ot time, but it's truly worth it!
In Febrauary I decided that the blanket would have been a great anniversary gift (our anniversary is in late September), so with a clear deadline ahead I knew how many squares I had to do each month to reach the goal.

In the end I finished her (because THE BLANKET is always a SHE) just some days before our anniversary, and I was very happy to see how much BF loves her.
She now sits on the sofa of his living room (sorry no pic of her in her actual dwelling place).

Now do you wanna see her??
.
..
...

Here

she

come

Sitting on my parents bed in all her colorful, square glory!

Finally, some facts about her:
- 11 x 8 = 88 squares in total
- border made in simple granny, 4 rounds
- yarn: blend 70% wool 30% acrilic
- colours: around 20, the pic shows the first that I bought but I added others along the journey

- balls: i think something between 30 and 40!!

Hope you liked this TA-DAH, others are on their way, I promise I won't take so many months to write them!

See you in a couple of days for the May Memories round up and the projects for Jumanji June... I foresee a big HD there!

Tuesday, 22 May 2012

Hi!
First I want to welcome my last two followers, hi! I'm so glad you decided to follow me!

This past weekend had been a busy one: with such a weather, cold and rainy, I spent a lot of time inside, mainly stitching, but also crocheting a bit.

On Sunday we had a new moon, so it was time for

Here's my ORT jar: you can still see a little bit of blue from PL that I've stitched in April, then a lot of yellow from "C'è una strada nel bosco" and on top of that some red, from my Saturday IHSW stitching...

In the last months I missed the IHSW, but not this month!

I first stitched on Christmas Rules by L*K, restitching all the word Christmas I wasn't happy with ( you may remember it ) finished also the word rules, the snowman and the tree. Alas! for finish the header I'm missing two colors, a trip to my LNS is needed...

Then I stitched on HOAN by LHN, here's the progress...

And that's all for now. I'm off to have a look at yours IHSW progress!

Wednesday, 16 May 2012

I decided to postpone my Wipocalypse post because on the 6th of May I hadn't started to stitch on "A path in the wood" yet, so the only pic in the post would have been the one of my last progress on PL. So I waited until today, to share something else.
I finished page 1 of "A path in the wood"! YAY!!
I know it's not much, and there are still 7 pages left, but this a milestone for me!
I started this project before I started blogging, more than 5 years ago!!! It's a wonderful design but back then I was at the very begging of my stitching journey and it turned out to be far too difficult for me.
Enough talk, here's the pic

Next weekwnd is IHSW, I think that this month I'll hermit, the weather forecast says we're going to have a very dismal, wet and cold weekend, perfect to stay indoors enjoying some stitching!

If you want to hermit too, just hop over to Joszye's blog and sign up!

Tuesday, 1 May 2012

Hi!
I've promised you a flowery post but I'm saving it for next week, since during the weekend there will be a floral fair in a nearby town, so more flowers to show you other than those I could show you today.

We're now into May, so it's time for the wrap-up of Amazon April Theme-a-licious: work on you biggest project. For me was Paradigm Lost by Long Dog Sampler.
This is it on April 1st

I've managed to finish page 3

And start page 4

And this is the whole piece.

As Heather says: Now it's time for...

May Memories

Remember when you took that class? Or decided to
commemorate that event? And then abandoned your poor WIP? Take a stroll
down memory lane by working on it again.

She also suggests: But you could also use this month to work on your oldest WIP(s)!

And that's what I'm about to do, for May Memories I'll be working on

This piece is called "C'è una strada nel bosco" which means "There's a path in the wood" and I've found it on an Italian magazine. For now it's only a mass of blurs, but it will eventually transform into this: